Scatological Investigations

The varied and colourful droppings of the ubiquitous North Western Crow are a source of information for the eclectic nature of their dietary habits. For those of us of a coprophitic bent, the seasonal changes and omnivorous habits of this species, Corvus caurinus,is worthy of study since they are one of the most adaptable of birds, their success based on diet and teamwork. The pianist and I, living as we do in the country on Lotus Island, have the fortune, or misfortune, of having a large painted deck under three mature Western Red Cedar trees that serve as a table-toilet for crows. The volume and character of the droppings change remarkably through the season and as I clear the tree droppings on the deck and its furniture daily with my gas powered blower I observe; dry small cones, and lichen and moss fragments from the crow disturbance and the little red squirrel scratchings,and the spontaneous needle decidua. In the spring, small dead cedar branches are ripped from the tree by crows for nest repair and are often dropped, or dismissed for being unsuitable for repair. When I have rid the deck of tree detritus, I have the opportunity to investigate the associated scat and leftovers, clam shells, half eaten cherries and red plums that have slipped through their toes after initially being successfully pinioned on the branch. Naked cherry and plum stones, flesh successfully eaten in full. The scat from clams and tube worms, small birds or baby quail,sweet cherries and wild plums, pear and apple fragments, all leave a digested colourful deposit of brown crunchy, smooth or particulate, black and punctate, white and thin and watery; all with an interesting textural variety and compelling graphic intricacies within the scat splat, Rorschach like in nature: all scat pockmarking the deck with remarkable tenacity,resistant to the hose sprayer and requiring a stiff brush, elbow grease and spray to remove. Even the glass topped table and patio chairs are a scat target and all varieties are equally adherent on the glass and metal. If you are willing to pay the price for clean eating on a deck, under spreading cedar trees, in crow and berry territory, you will never resent the blow and spray and brush activity. Between the scat and the copious water spray, the cedars are secondary beneficiaries for the role they serve as a table-toilet. Live and let live with Mother Nature in all her glory.

Beerbelly-Spindleshanks

The middle aged males in my paternal line have slid into this physiognomy without the benefit of beer or exercise indolence. It's DNA all the way! That's not to admit that strong drink was always avoided, or that Shank's mare was never a form of transport,but the anatomy of our middle age, from all the photos, was a bond handed down from our distant Irish family Patrones. Some years ago I was walking from the preanaesthetic room as a patient to the operating room in one of those skimpy little gowns that demonstrate all of what you want no one to see. The nurses were all my intimate friends and therefore were licenced to be rude, as are all who love or care for you! They had all assisted me in the Orthopedic OR for years and were delighted to see me horizontal rather than vertical. Kathy, one of the nurse assistants said, "You know,when you are walking, especially in shorts, you look like a fat man being carried by a chicken!" It rolled off my back since I have always given as good as I got, and if it gave them all pleasure I didn't want to deny them. In middle age I was never a flat bellied, six pack man, with legs like tree trunks. I carried rather the family's signal physiognomy! I belonged and so did most of my brothers! When you have good friends or family that love you or love to be with you, there is a joyous opportunity to engage the licence to be rude. We would like to be long-lived,but only as long as the price is, that it doesn't seem to be long. It's too late to correct the spindleshanks, but probably is within one's grasp to modify the beerbelly without denial of one's allegiance to one's own breed features!

Mankind as Meat

Peter, a former rector of mine with whom I had a friendly but occasionally chequered relationship, was mildly intrigued, and possibly repulsed, that my job as an orthopedic surgeon involved cutting into the human body! He often greeted me with the salutation, "How is Chop-Chop today?" It was never a question, though he may have believed it was. I believe he thought this was funny. I was never able to cope with this greeting satisfactorily. I brushed it off as his unique sense of humor and shrugged with a smile. It is however, a classical example of words that betray thoughts. It did provide me with some insight into the gestalt of some, that we are made in the image of God, but it is not important to embrace the fact that we are meat. We are meat, and God and Nature, all his handiwork, is one; and much of his handiwork is meat. Luckily for me, my son, also a rector, was with me one day when I was greeted by my friend Peter who said gaily to me in his usual fashion, "Have you done any Chop-Chop today?" My boy looked him over and asked in response, "Have you done any Mumble-Mumble today?" It's a blessing to have someone stand for you. Peter's wife, who was party to this exchange mused about Chop-Chop. "Maybe what Peter asks is rude!", she thought aloud. I think not! It is all a matter of perspective. "I worship, therefore I am!", we say. "I think, therefore I am!", we say. "I cut meat: I screw bones together, therefore I am!", I said.

The Unheavenly Host

And there came to Lotus Island in the year of the Dragon, the unheavenly host of tent caterpillars, targeting and ravaging the soft leaf trees, devastating the landscape thoughout the island. I am reminded of the drought years of the early 40's on the bald prairie with the grasshopper clouds, eating every grain in sight, leaving so much bodily debris and grasshopper juice on the grill and windows of one's car that it was difficult to travel. They even constructed grasshopper screens for the car grill in those days. The windscreen looked like a deluge of tobacco spit from the spittoon. A repeat worm plague today on Lotus island, resembling the plague of locusts in old Egypt and Kindersley from yester-millennium and yesteryear. The tent caterpillars on Lotus Island have now left the trees and are in cocoons, metamorphosing into the adult moth form in mid July. There is, I am happy to report, a glimmer of light on the horizon, at least on the patch of ground of the pianist and the elderly eclectic gentleman. I took apart and examined 50 cocoons on my blueberry patch. The cocoons are of an intricate construction. They comprise an inner sack that contains the headless black nymph, awaiting transformation from Cinderella to Princess. This is a secondary oval silken sack, finely woven and close ended. The outer cocoon is a loosely woven primary sack designed initially by the worm to secure the later inner sack to the leaf and branch. 50 compound sacks were investigated by me yesterday. There were only 5 sacks containing a healthy black, headless instar that will transform to a moth.The balance of the sacks contained dead or immature worms in a state of dissolution, empty sacks without exit holes, or parasitic larvae, not identified, foraging on worm carcases. There were no further gestating nymphs in metamorphoses. Today I see the devastated trees are beginning to re-leaf and the meagre 10 percent cycle success suggested by my admittedly short and local series, still gives me some cause for optimism that the plague cycle has peaked. I may be dreaming in vain but, unlike Joseph,I can not interpret a dream. Nevertheless, like Pandora's box, Hope remained available in the box, while the Evils spread their wings and entered the world.

A Good Worker

If I heard it once I heard it a thousand times in my growing up period on the bald prairie! It may have been one of those prairie truisms that arose out of pioneer stock and depression realities. It was a black and white judgement and it comprised largely criteria that if you were one of those workers it entailed, time spent, muscle, consistancy and promptitude, rather than cleverness! My dad had a lot to say about people who were for him, not good workers; a beard was an indication of this, as well as those who had their hands in their pockets. Imbued as I was with his mantra I never wanted to appear as if I wasn't in constant motion, doing something, almost anything as long as there appeared to be action to avoid being labelled a bad worker. As an old man I still have an unreasonable fear to be seen lolling about if a cleaning woman or gardener or some sort of tradesperson is here serving us. I race to get dressed in my work clothes before they arrive. Loath to be seen as one of the idle rich! I drive the pianist crazy with my eye on the clock when an appointment looms as if I may not appear on time. I have never grown a beard or put my hands in the pocket without immediately withdrawal of something from it; anything! When we first went to England as a young man in 1961 to live and work as an orthopedic registrar, the pianist and I were invited to a large cocktail party by way of initiation to the community, a mixed gathering. One gentleman of about 40 that I met, I asked in the usual Canadian manner of starting a polite conversation, "What do you do?" "Nothing," he said, "Mummy left me pots!" He smiled indulgently! Canadian eh! I don't think I have ever heard that since, nor had I heard it before, given as a simple statement of fact without a scintilla of embarrassment. Coming from a working class prairie environment I found myself in awe of his genuine self satisfaction that didn't need to scurry around and appear to be working in order to justify one's existence! I don't think I ever achieved that sense of comforting entitlement. Still haunted by reward and punishment. Who knew!

Maple Pole Bean Mania

Cobble Hill Ruthie and I were talking bean stakes yesterday as she was having trouble finding suitable ones. Her pole beans are now up! I told her I used fresh cut Maple sapling shoots. They grow all over Lotus Island on the edge of the roadside ditches and are now 8 to 12 feet long! They are perfect for that use and they are free! If one is careful while cutting the shoot at the base so as to not disturb the cambium layer which protects the phloem and xylem, and uses a dibble to make the holes, they will root since they have Force Majeure and you must have planted a node with the germinal root cells well below the surface of the dirt. When the shoots are first selected while in the ditch, this Old One may seem a madman to the vehicular traffic as they whiz by on the road at eye-level. By now the shoots are branching from the nodes so they are trimmed and l leave the trimmings in the ditch. I leave an inch of branch on each sapling for the subsequent purchase of the bean stringers as they grow.The pole beans I use are Blue Lake, for no good reason, but because I always have. These plants are heavy but they have strong positive thigmotropism and could cling to a pig-greased pole, nevertheless it is best to augment with purchase points which will cause them to curl tightly and hang on. A good homemade dibble is an old broom. Drill a big hole 6 inches from the end of the handle and shove in a long bolt of matching size through the hole. Leave the worn out broom on as a lever. Your foot on the bolt plunges the dibble into the dirt and if you use the broom as a lever, you can wiggle your dibble. Stack the shoots around your bean sprouts and bind them together high up like a teepee. There are a lot of pluses to these stakes. As the stake begins to root, the beans begin to climb with considerable celerity. The weight of the beans causes the flexible cane to bend which tightens the bean stringers. The lateral stringers tighten too, so the bean-sapling unit becomes a taut one and therefore stong. The rooting capacity provides a firm foundation from both bean and shoot. The rooted sapling sucks up nitrogen but the bean is a nitrogen fixator and so, pays it forward. Isn't Mother Nature wonderful in its symbiosis? Success in human nature is no different than the bean-stake unit. Strong; flexible; rooted; teamwork; paying forward; bean counting;and self-sustaining. Standing up at your head height, where the air is clear and the sun is bright. As I thought about Ruthie yesterday, I also thought about Jack and his mother and his cow-for-bean enterprise. I have an interest in plant sounds, especially beans. Listen closely with each ear/ Batteries charged so one can hear/ Trill but soft, a little thrum/ Fee and Fie -- Foe and Fum!

A Braided Cord

A braided hawser-laid cord of three strands bound together with one another, each strand providing a share of strength but the braiding allowing an elastic moment, tightening and loosening as the braid torque allows, but at no cost of strength. The strand of Reason weaves through and around the strands of Tradition and Scripture, imparting a horizontal moment without compromise of the strength; only the ability of the whole to stretch when weighted down. Where the first fibres that make up a strand arose from is a mystery, but they are called Spirit. Which strand was constructed first from these fibres, we may know from the history, but each strand is made of the same spun fibres of Spirit. The whole is more than the sum of its parts because of the integral moment of the braid design. What is certain is that, aside from which strand was built first, the whole cord was built, longer and longer with the strands meeting together, acting as one.

Fondue and Artichoke

In the 60's, fondue was all the rage! Cool folks huddled around hot cooking oil in a communal pot on the dining room table. Cubes of beef sizzling on a sharp fork, falling off of it into the pot, sometime-chefs, poking around with the fork to find it and knocking off everyone else's meat. The product often crispy fried as a result, and then dipped in creamy dill or plum sauce. I hated fondue but the pianist liked it and also pursued chocolate fondue with strawberries and cheese fondue with bread cubes. There was always the greedy guy who quickly cooked more than his share of the meat, frequently almost raw, and poked his fork in your product as you cooked it ever so gently. He often put too much rapidly in at one time and cooled off the oil, dribbled the oil on the tablecloth and either burned his tongue, or poked it with his sharp two pronged fondue fork. For those who enjoyed a languid eating style it was a conversational bonanza while your little cube was cooking and a socially satisfying endeavor despite the rampant eater with his mouth full at the table head. I always,in fact, sympathized with the trencherman but restrained myself mightily from copying his technique in deference to the pianist. Fondue is just not a guy thing and mercifully has succumbed to the fast food ethos! The garden at Lotus Island has Globe Artichokes, another clone-like contributor of the Slow Loris eating industry! Sucking and scraping away at the sepals of the flower after dipping in garlic butter, the eater will have to bath and change his clothing to rid the grease and fuzz. Dipping the soft and tasteless bases of the calyx is a greasy act of slow dissection,ridding oneself of the nascent petals which guarantees the rest of your meal will get cold; while filling the garbage pail with the uneatable 99 percent of the artichoke.My advice to artichoke lovers is let them flower into their magnificent purple thistle-like flower head and put them on the table as a table centre with your meat and potatoes!

Formication and Slug Fest

The tent caterpillars are now dropping like rain from their webs after the feeding frenzy, having denuded most of the soft leaf trees on Lotus Island. They are now resting for two weeks on any object they fall on, including the unwary. As they fall on the neck or head or clothing of the passer-by they perform jactitations, swiveling and squirming here and there, giving rise to feelings like formicatiom that linger in one's mind into the night in bed when one wakes with the distinct sense that something is still crawling on the limb and trunk. Soon the worms that survive will cocoon 'til the middle of July and then emerge in force as yellow orange moths. Imagine the bizarre tactile hallucinations of the psychiatric patient afflicted with symptoms of formication and the desperation to sweep or swat what is not there. The rain forest on Lotus Island has also had a profusion of slugs as well, munching the vegetation below in concert with the caterpillars as the trees are munched above, the ground feeding especially vexing to the gardener of iris and dahlia. However,the nightly visits to the garden by the gardener, dividing the slugs in half with sharp secateurs as he weaves through the rain of worms, is the most humane and satisfying of pursuits. The small bodies of the slugs and caterpillars, oozing out the green juices of the gardener's vegetation, when chopped, is sweet revenge. Tossing at night,waking in a world of squirm and slime! Carpe diem!

A Food Source

Mother Nature and Human Nature are really One. If we see ourselves as a food source amongst our other useful attributes, we can embrace the universality of all the ions and atoms we are related to, plant and animal and mineral that spend much of the time eating and being eaten by one another, perched on the food chain of life and death. If you believe that you are at the top of the food chain, know that you are food for the mosquito, tape worm, E.coli, the commensals, and at the end, the Yew tree, the grass, the vultures and other members of the so-called lower orders that enjoy you in perpetuity,along with the maggotry that eventually conquers the embalmer. The lower end of the food chain, for which we are a constant source of food, completes the circle of life. We eventually embrace the mineral world when those bones will rise again. Therefore it is hard to call those feeders the lower order, since we all are part of the wheel of life.There is no humility in this matter. There is no humility in being one with Human Nature and Mother Nature. The sin in the Garden of Eden was the sin of believing that we were diffent than the garden and could freely eat of the Tree of Knowledge rather than be content in the shade of the Tree of Life!

The Start and Finish of Golf

During the war years, when we lived on the Bald Prairie in Kindersley, Saskatchewan, I golfed with my mother. I was from 7 to 10 years old and golfed with her clubs, sharing them as we went around the 9 hole golf club south of the tracks. I don't think the course was ever irrigated: I remember it as always brown, had oiled sand greens and it was as flat as a pancake.It even had the occasional cow turd as I recall. I think it was rough where it was trod and really rough where it wasn't! Mum and I both loved fried mushrooms and part of my job while playing was to dig them up as we went around. The best ones were the mushrooms that hadn't emerged but showed the telltale cracking of the crust of earth. She and I would have a feast when we got home. My mother was a dreadful golfer but determined and a round with her consisted of a swing,25 oaths, always "damn", and moving forward, ignoring the divot and creating one from the mushroom digging. I stopped golfing after 10 until I turned 50 when my friend George said to me, "Warren, If you don't start golfing now, you will never be any good." I took it to heart and joined the Lotus City golf club, beautiful links, and the pianist bought me an enormous collection of clubs for my birthday with a bag that was so heavy I could hardly carry it. Many of my friends and colleagues golfed there and I bought classic clothing so I would look the part, golf gloves, umbrella, ball retriever and Gor-Tex rainware. I dutifully took lessons and practised all aspects of the short and long game. I remained as lousy a golfer as my mother despite my best efforts. It wasn't all bad. I really never kept score so I could always think of the 4 great shots I had over the 18 holes. I was an agreeable partner, so was sought after by the equally agreeable since I was so bad it made them feel good about their own game. I felt this was a useful service. The downside of the course, recognized as one of the most beautiful in the country, was that there were no mushrooms. I developed Rheumatoid Arthritis after 10 years so eventually gave up playing for the second time in my life. George was right at least about the fun; I was never any good, but the beauty of the walk on the course made up for it, even without the mushrooms.

Re-creation

This is not a sport! It's serious business! Listening to the current concern, that mankind will falter with the looming changes in climate, food production,and population gives the sense that we must alter the environment! When Jacob Bronoski wrote the screenplay for The Ascent of Man his thesis was that mankind itself was capable of adaptation to change and not a victim of the natural environment as were other life forms. The capacity for abstract reasoning and foresight; the ability to change, adapt and thrive in all manner of adversity was in the past peculiar to man alone! Civilizations came and went, but mankind evolved! The vulnerability of the less adaptable life forces depend on the human capacity to address the changes in the interest of all. Currently pessimism seems rampant! The media is full of dirt and gloom. The comment boards are dominated by the haters. The Jeremiads are in full gallop down the hill. In our little group we discussed this week the sins of the flesh we all possess and the need to repress them in order to function. What we didn't talk about was the nobility of mankind; the love, the drive, the intellect and the willingness to sacrifice to the greater good and to put off immediate gratification for the sake of a greater and later good. I brought it up in the group but it went nowhere since we all prefer speaking of sin over goodness except a few of us sissies. Surely there is a balance in mankind that seems to have become obscured lately. If we are to survive and thrive in these seasons of change, then re-creation will need to occur with the opening, not closure of the human spirit. Not hunkering down, but utilizing the ever present noble side of our nature to open up and embrace the challenge with optimism!

Grammatical corruption

Its, it's and 'tis! My colleague Tony castigates me repeatedly for the use of "it's" for the possessive pronoun. In an editing workshop last week I posed a question to the group,by asking why, if a mule's ears are long and hairy,why not "it's" ears are long and hairy? To say that the possessive "its" ought not have an apostrophe, while the noun it reflects does, makes no sense to me. The consensus at the workshop was that it differentiated the use of the two words. Why would anyone care to go there? The context declares it! Then I read in the grammar detective, that "it's" as a possessive pronoun, was used on a regular basis a couple of centuries ago but was changed to "its" when "'tis" became deemed archaic, so "it's" was substituted for "'tis" as a contraction of "it is" and "it's" was shoved out of the rightful place as a possessive by the grammarians. What the hell! I can hardly wait to confront Tony, start using "'tis" again, for "it is" and talk about mule's ears without a lame excuse about differentiation. What a contrarian either I am or English is!

Penny for your Plots

Monday, my daughters and their partners came and planted the ailing elderly gentleman's dahlias in his time established (in modesty I can't say honored) protocol. In short, when the soil warms and the muck goes, a hole is dug every 18 inches, 8 inches deep; a handful of 13-16-10 is chucked in; the Mantis is jumped from hole to hole to make a soft feathery bed for the little creature, and a 5 foot rebar is hammered in next to the creature so we know where the shoot will emerge when we weed. The rebar is always on the north side of the creature which is covered with 2 inches of soil and lightly tamped. Later, hilled in! My family planted over 200 dahlias in exemplary fashion. One of the faults of some exhibition dahlias is weak flower stems! Large blooms with weak stems and the floppy, droopy appearance is a big no-no! Out with it! Off with their heads! Some time ago the pianist noted that the cut bouquets of tulips stay ramrod straight in the vase if a couple of copper pennies are placed in the water at the time of arrangement. I have, in the past, scoffed at her assertion, accusing her of swami-like thinking, but double blind studies, albeit ineptly done in our living room, suggest it might be the case. Unfortunately, I didn't think of pennies and her protocol in time to consider activating the technique into my current dahlia scheme. I'll do it next year if I am still here and alive. Another use for the dying Canadian penny! Chucking a couple of pennies in the hole maybe a cure for the more beautiful of the Droops.

A Person

In the days of spontaneous abortion, if you held a 14 week foetus in a kidney basin that made silent mouth opening signs, chest fluttering, and limb writhing activity, it seemed like a person and you might have strong feelings thereupon about personhood. If you were the parent of a 13 year old girl who ran away from home because she was pregnant by her brother and you were in agony to find her before she did something desperate, you also might have strong feelings about personhood. Maybe Jeremiah 1:5 is wrong. No amount of abstract reasoning by elderly judges, swayable politicians or fossilized medievalists will answer this question. There there may be an answer but there is no solution arising that satisfies! Content ourselves therefore that we are merely tissue in a world of a Petri Dish? I have no ideas that are useful! What may work? Depersonhood! It may be easier to see ourselves as tissue that talks rather than barks!

Thumb and Sinew

Ten days ago I ruptured my left thumb extensor tendon. I have Rheumatoid arthritis and it was an attrition rupture due to the long standing tenosynovitis the tendon had to traverse to cinch up for its muscle, Extensor Pollicus Longus. Because of the shoals and pitfalls of the four inches of Rheumatoid tenosynovitis at the wrist level, instead of gliding smoothly on a sea of serenity, the tendon was secondarily softened and degenerate and liable to fray and split with little or no direct violence. I suddenly noted after lawn cutting I could not move the thumb out from my palm. Luckily we have been provided with two extensor tendons to the adjacent index finger. We only need one tendon, so a transfer of one of these tendons to replace the gap in the thumb tendon was done along with the removal of the erosive source. Now the index finger extensor muscle, Extensor Indices Proprius and its tendon will have to be taught to be a good little thumb extensor.Homo sapiens could never have spanned the head of Neanderthal man in order to bash it against a rock unless he could fully extend the thumb to reach an octave length. Homo sapiens could never develop fine and complex pinch and text unless he could lift the thumb out of the palm. Mankind"s opposable thumb is the singularity that has allowed the use of this early gift in the development of intellect! The sinews are the source of mankind's strength and complexity! We no longer have a hand that can only hook and clench,it can grip and pinch! Arborial becomes terrestrial!

Justice and Fairness

The pianist and I were sitting in the car having lunch at Beacon Hill Park. It was cold today so we ate in the car rather than on the park bench by the flower beds. The Mallards, man and wife, two seagulls and several crows wandered around idly looking for a free meal. When the pianist had her fill of sandwiches she tore off the crusts to feed the ducks who were the closest and they began to vie with one another, but were polite, just ramped up the waddle and began to eat their fill. The seagulls of course noticed and rushed over, but the safe distance they allow an approach is further away than the ducks, so they were slightly out of range from the spoils. Now the pianist likes ducks better than seagulls, even if the gulls are more beautiful, but she is compelled to follow justice and fairness called "sharing"! They may be beautiful but they are stupid and when food looms they call all their friends rather than "shutting up", and when the others arrived they fought them for the food. Bad planning, not altruism. They have also learned to scream and beg by a head nodding up-tic. The pianist in the interest of fairness, justice and accommodation, took pity and hurled the crust portions to them as far as a crust will fly! I think this concern for equitable distribution is a female characteristic arising from the matronly urge to meet the needs of all, the long and the short and the tall, the noisy and the quiet! The cacophony from the seagulls drew the attention of the crows as well, who arrived in force, but they have an even longer safe distance to maintain from the human food source. It was impossible for her to meet their need. They looked forlorn as the pianist tried her best to break bread with the fearful and skittish. They just couldn't out muscle the gulls, couldn't cosy up to the humans like the ducks and the pianist couldn't throw that far. She did her best but despite the fact that the crows are the smartest birds around, they are going to have to use their brains instead of being pretty and tough! Or else eat alone!

Heart vs Brain

Soul vs Sense; Architecture vs Horticulture; Man vs Women. How the pianist has put up with my plant peccadilloes over the years is a tribute to her tolerance of my relative inanity! Since I am a  known pruneophobic, I have so far succeeded in withstanding all efforts to curb both my enthusiasm for large house plants, and for not curbing them from wherever they want to wander. I am not a stern parent with plants, as I want them to be happy and free, as I am. They are more like my brothers. My 30 year old rubber tree is about 25 feet tall and the view of our stairs to the bedroom is now hidden in its underbrush. A female realtor carefully suggested, not to give offense, that the architecture of the stairway was of such interest it would be an advantage to see it. My equally old Hoya vine  climbs up to the top of a 28 foot beam to the bedroom and balances the rubber tree. The realtor suggested that a mighty beam of that nature might usefully be seen advantageously as well, rather than assumed to be there! A second Hoya in the dining room had penetrated into the ceiling boards in an attempt to escape the room. This Easter weekend will be a watershed for these plants since the pianist, my daughters and the realtor all have agreed that I have reached the end of the road and must control my neurosis. They were kind and no one suggested I was weird. Radical pruning of the rubber tree will produce a pint of white sap to be collected so sheets over the rug below are a must. The Hoyas will cling to ceiling and beam, and we may hear them scream, so ear plugs are a must. Since I am an Asclepiad by profession , I am related in a sense to the Hoya (Asclepiadaceae), my cousin. I know that the women are right! I have strained the pianist's forbearance long enough. The heavy artillery has acted. Group intervention was necessary! It's tough love! I am my brother's keeper after all is said and done. Group therapy may be needed for us plants but that will come. The architecture and common sense has  prevailed. Still, I hope romance is not entirely dead.

Gait and Posture

I often, in the midst of a busy Orthopedic practice, considered surreptitiously taking videos of my medical colleagues as part of a study of posture and gait. Observing the unique features of healthy men from the standpoint of the normal variants of gait and posture is of some interest to those of us concerned with musculo-skeletal anatomy and physiology! The long hospital corridors allowed me to clearly identify individuals I knew well, whose features were unclear from the distance, but whose gait and posture were identifiers. The good orthopedic surgeon was always aware of the need to observe the patient walking, sitting and standing as part of their assessment, apart from the necessity to do so where pathology existed. You can't always know abnormal, if you don't know the range of normal. For years I idly considered writing a chap book on the subject, or a chapter, based on my study but never got around to doing it, and now it's too late. Any way, it may have been too intrusive and earned me enmity! Still, I fondly remember examples! Drs. X and Y had short heel cords. A tight tendo achilles leads to a bouncy gait. The stride has a high amphlitude, so more energy is required to achieve the same distance. They would make a poor waiter or, in another era, a bad footman. A lax tendo achilles would lead to a low amplitude glider gait. They might say, no spring in his step! Good waiter material! Dr. Z had a military officer background. He stood erect and his head and eyes were directed upward to heaven as he marched down the hall! His gait and posture had an ethereal quality! Drs. A and B were topmost physicians and mild enemies. Nevertheless they required to speak of matters as they met in the hall. As they stood and talked of weighty matters they slowly rotated to the right in tandem, as it were, getting to the most vulnerable side of one another simultaneously! Pushmepullyou! The more florid variations of gait and posture are the most interesting but all of us have unique characteristics only modified from time to time by the state of mind. Mind- body activity will alter, but not fundamentally change. I have a neighbor who has a PhD in Industrial Ergonomics. My missed opportunity was to fail to do a collaborative paper with her at the right time. Oh well!

Shit-mix

It may have been a Byronic Moment when I encountered shit-mix for the first time! Living with three adolescent teen and pre-teen children in Lotus City was a busy time for the pianist and me. Our down time for communication was the supper hour and after that I often went back to work or watched the hockey game. My daughter told me recently that the pediatrics learned to always show me, and get the report card signed, when the game was at a critical spot; so they were craftier than I thought! I had remained naively unaware of that subterfuge! "Hey Dad can you sign this?" I say "can", not "will", because I could sign my name without looking at what I was signing. I'm not proud of this! Also, another one of my pleasures was an abundant and varied liquor cupboard with a selection of offerings. That array provided a welcome choice for an after work libation! I did notice eventually that my supply was diminishing, but faster than my efforts could explain, and the leakage was evenly distributed. The pianist started looking to see how many finger widths were in my glass. I recognized the look but pled innocent! I began to wise up and, unannounced, marked with a felt pen the existing levels in the bottles. Over the next week or two, all the bottle's contents "evaporated" a half inch! I got a lock for my liquor cupboard door and kept the key. I mentioned to the local grocer, a friend, later in the month that I had solved my problem of the disappearing booze. He said, "The kids from the school are drinking what they call shit-mix! You mix half an inch or less from all the liquor bottles and come here for orange crush and put it in the bicycle bottle with the liquor mix! They have a big party at Gyro park! It must taste awful!" I can't say I was surprised. I can say that I was impressed with the creative drive they showed. It provided a good measure of invention and portended well for their future despite or because of the willingness to tolerate swill! It was a stunning Moment when I realized they were flesh! It was like a lock suddenly unsnapped in my head! Perhaps a good parent wouldn't have been amused!